Advertising is the way companies sell their products. Not all advertising is truthful, however. For example, tobacco companies do not tell the whole truth about cigarettes. What they are trying to do is to get you to start smoking. If you do, you will likely become addicted, and getting you to spend your money on cigarettes. Cigarette companies need you to start smoking because people are dying from smoking and they need you to replace them.
Cigarette ads always show strong, healthy, happy people. What they don't show are the consequences of smoking. For example, one of the models for Marlboro died of lung cancer and the man who played the Winston Man is paralyzed on one side of his body as a result of smoking and he can no longer do the things he did in the ads.
The cigarette companies create ads specifically to appeal to girls. These ads always show a beautiful, slim, smiling young woman doing something fun. What they don't say is that cigarettes stain teeth and leave stains on fingertips and fingernails. Cigarettes make your breath and cloths stink.
Suggested Interactive Activities:
- Discuss other ways girls can help keep their friends/peers from smoking.
- Identify local authority for reporting stores that sell cigarettes to minors, ads that target kids, billboards advertising cigarettes that haven't been taken down.
- Have girls meet with local government officials about monitoring ads.
|
